Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas has conceded he made the wrong decision to only complete a single hot lap at the end of Q3 at Portimao, with team-mate Lewis Hamilton taking his 97th career pole position.
Bottas led every session ahead Q3’s commencement but found himself one-tenth slower than Hamilton at the end of the final session.
Mercedes switched to the Medium tyre for the final run after it deemed it was quicker than the Softs, which were used for their first timed laps in Q3.
While Hamilton went for two timed laps at the end of the session, Bottas opted for one – which he admits was the incorrect decision.
“At the end we decided to go for the Medium based on the feeling previously in qualifying,” Bottas said.
“The Medium actually felt a tiny bit quicker than the Softs so that was the reason. Then it was choosing if we should do two timed laps with the cooldown in between or just one timed lap.
“With one time lap you can have less fuel in the car, but you might struggle with the tyre warmup.
“I went for that, it was my decision to go for one time because it worked in Q2. Apparently, it seems like doing two timed laps for Lewis was better.
“It was a decent lap, not perfect. It’s been tricky here to get really clean laps this weekend because of the way the track is.
“I think the lap was good. Ultimately, I should have gone for two timed [laps] as well.”
Bottas will line-up in second place on the dirty side of the grid on Mediums while Max Verstappen, who qualified in third, will have Soft tyres for the opening laps.
The Finn concedes that it “would have been nice to be on the clean side in P1” but aims to “do whatever I can from P2”.
